Anna
Following the unexpected (not to mention unwanted) visit from Bree, Jack had spent most of the long weekend trying to get Anna to answer his calls. He decided he would give her a few days, then surely she would’ve calmed down some and would be willing to listen to what he had to say. It was rational, it was the truth and he would’ve thought she would give him the opportunity to present all the facts before jumping to a conclusion given that she was a lawyer herself.
On Tuesday, when he walked into The Bookworm, Anna was noticeably absent. He placed his order with Teddy then moved to pay Sera. He could see Tilly working away in the kitchen, but there was no sign of Anna, or Juliette, for that matter. He could remember only a few occasions when he’d come into the café and Juliette wasn’t there. When he prodded Sera about Anna’s whereabouts, she narrowed her eyes and glared at him suspiciously.
‘Why you asking?’
He shrugged and tried to remain nonchalant. ‘I haven’t seen her in a few days and I was wondering how she was.’
‘She’s in Coffs with Juliette…’ Sera paused and was suddenly cagey. ‘They had some stuff to do.’
His thoughts jumped to Juliette’s wellbeing. She had seemed all right at the barbecue, but he knew her illness was terminal and a turn for the worse at some point, either sooner or later, was inevitable. ‘Is Juliette okay?’
‘Yeah, it’s just a…’ Sera caught herself and narrowed her eyes again.
‘I know about Juliette,’ Jack answered the question he knew was on the tip of Sera’s tongue.
‘How?’
This was a tricky one. There was no way he was about to breach his legal relationship with Juliette, but he was able to disclose a version of the truth. ‘I helped her out with the contract when she decided on the expansion, she came in about a month ago to wrap up a few things and told me.’ He wasn’t sure if Sera bought his story, but she didn’t push him and he was relieved. ‘So, is she okay?’
‘Yeah, it’s only a routine visit. We tried to get her to consider chemo again, even radiation but…’ Sera shook her head. ‘It’s what she wants, even if Anna and I don’t agree.’
‘You and Anna are agreeing on something?’ Jack knew Anna and Sera had had a pretty rough reunion (if you could call it that) and there didn’t seem to be much love lost between them, but to their credit, they were trying to be civil towards one another.
‘I know,’ Sera said sarcastically. ‘Who would’ve thought?’
Teddy called his order and Jack moved over to retrieve it. He said goodbye and was all set to leave when a comment from Sera stopped him in his tracks.
‘She’s pissed at you.’
‘Who?’
Sera pursed her lips. ‘Like you don’t know.’
He knew exactly who. Anna.
‘Did she say anything?’ Jack couldn’t believe how juvenile he sounded. It was like he was back in high school.
She shook her head. ‘Look, we’re not back to being bum chums or anything like that, but I know that you wanted to kiss her the other night. So you must like her, right?’
Jesus. Jack shifted uncomfortably. ‘Ah yeah…’ he managed to mumble. Now he really felt like he was back in high school.
‘Well, I got the vibe that she was into you too so I am not sure what you did to fuck it up but she was mighty pissed off all weekend.’
He swore under his breath and shook his head. ‘I…Bree Thomas happened.’ When Sera responded with a raised eyebrow and less than impressed look on her face, Jack elaborated.
‘I ran into her earlier that day, she knew there was a barbecue at mine and somehow she thought it was an open party. She turned up after everyone had left, when it was just Anna and I, she was dressed pretty suggestively and…’
‘Let me guess, Anna thought Bree had come for a booty call.’
Jack nodded and Sera sniggered. ‘Bree Thomas is a cow.’
‘There’s nothing going on between us. I mean we did have one date and I stress one.’
‘Hey, it’s not me you have to convince. It’s Anna.’
Jack let out an exasperated sigh. ‘But she won’t take my calls. I’ve tried messaging her but no response.’ If he didn’t have his hands laden with coffees, he would’ve thrown them up in defeat.
‘You know, if you really like her, don’t give up. Anna has a habit of shutting herself out from the world when things get too hard. For a smart girl she can be dumb sometimes. Trust me, I’ve been there with her.’
And judging by Sera’s tone of bitterness, he didn’t doubt her.
Jack thought about Sera’s advice as he walked to his office. ‘…if you really like her, don’t give up.’ Yeah, he really liked her and as for giving up, he never considered himself a quitter and there was no reason to start now.
* * *
October had always been a busy time in the Kendall household. Anna’s parents’ anniversary was on the seventh then she and her dad shared a birthday less than a week later on the twelfth. One of her earliest birthday memories was of her and her dad blowing out the candles on a cake together. She had always thought it a wonderful thing to share such a special day with her dad. She thought fate had given them a unique bond, a gift.
But the older Anna got, the more she became aware of who her father really was. She realised the date of her birth had been predetermined. Her mother’s obstetrician was going on leave so he scheduled her an induction. Just so happened that the twelfth of October was the date. A doctor decided her birth date, not fate, and as for sharing it with her father, well, there were about nineteen million other people who were born on the same day and she probably had more in common with at least half of them than she had with her own father.
The first few years after he left were the hardest. She didn’t know how to celebrate her birthday on her own, but slowly as the years went on, she made the day her own. Until today.
Being back in Ellesmere stirred unwanted memories of birthdays long gone and she had hoped Juliette had forgotten. But Juliette never forgot. She was one of the few people who still sent her birthday cards every year, so Anna wasn’t surprised that she remembered. But she was mildly (to say the least) shocked that Sera had remembered. At first she thought Juliette must’ve reminded her, but by the look of pleasant surprise on her face, Anna knew that wasn’t the case.
‘So what do you want to do, birthday girl?’ Juliette asked brightly as she placed the kettle on the stove.
Anna shrugged. ‘Nothing.’ And she meant it. The last thing she wanted was to make a big deal about getting older when Juliette was never going to have another birthday.
‘You can’t do nothing, we have to celebrate somehow.’
‘Yeah,’ Sera concurred. ‘Gotta celebrate while we are young. Before you know it you’ll be old and grey and then you’ll have no desire to celebrate anything.’ Mortification spread over Sera’s face. ‘Shit.’ She closed her eyes and thumped her palm against her forehead. ‘I’m such a dick, Juliette, I’m so sorry.’
Anna shot her a filthy look. Typical Sera. Mouthing off before thinking. ‘Good one, Sera.’
The shrill of the boiling kettle filled the room and Juliette stood up to take it off the stove. Surprisingly she looked unperturbed as she looked from Sera to Anna.
‘You are both making far too much of a big deal. It’s not my first time going through this, and not the first time that I have had to think about having a last birthday.’ Juliette poured them all a cup of tea and set the teapot in the centre of the table. ‘I know I’ve had my last birthday, I know that I’ll never live to turn thirty-two and I’ve made peace with that.’
It was both courageous and incredibly heartbreaking. There were few people Anna had met who could say they were at peace with knowing they were dying. Still, it was one thing knowing your days were numbered and it was another being content with your life. Anna wondered if Juliette had any regrets, anything that she wanted to change in her life. Her mind shifted to the search for Noah and the lack of success.
Sera’s phone call to Lucy, the nurse she’d run into at her last hospital visit with Juliette, hadn’t been returned. Not that she could say she was surprised. Lucy didn’t know Sera from a bar of soap and was no doubt bound by confidentiality, so she probably couldn’t tell them anything, but the truth was, without any decent leads to go on, their search was looking like a lost cause.
‘Still, it was very insensitive of Sera to say what she did.’ Anna couldn’t help but point it out.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake, Anna!’ Sera glared at her. ‘It was a mistake and I’m sorry. Build a bridge and get over it.’
Anna opened her mouth, poised to return a spray when the sound of Juliette laughing stopped her.
Sera and her turned to see Juliette wiping tears from her eyes. Was she crying or laughing? She was confused, and looking at Sera, she was too.
‘I’m sorry,’ Juliette said when she had managed to stop laughing. ‘It’s the summer of flies all over again.’
The summer of what? Anna was about to ask her friend to elaborate when Sera shook her head. ‘I can’t believe you remembered that.’
Anna wondered what they were talking about. Over the years she had learned to block out certain memories to do with her father, but the by-product was she had also lost other memories, good memories, and it seemed it might have been the case here.
‘Remind me again what the summer of flies was?’
Sera and Juliette turned to look at her. ‘Are you seriously telling me you don’t remember the summer of flies?’ Juliette asked.
‘How could you not?’ Sera said. ‘You practically lived on them.’
‘I what?’ Now Anna was past the point of confusion.
‘It was the summer after the pinky swear, remember how we had an infestation of flies?’ Juliette prodded but nothing came to Anna.
‘And there were a few times you actually swallowed them? Like the time we were at the Summer Fair and one flew into your ice-cream cup and you ate it?’
In a tiny corner of her mind Anna felt a lightbulb click on. Flashes, images, memories swirled. She closed her eyes and there they were. Juliette with her hazelnut and chocolate cone, Sera with her pistachio and lemon gelato concoction and she with her choc-mint and cookies and cream, waving off the swarm of flies, which in some cases were blowflies. She remembered how still the air was that afternoon and how sticky she felt and how the ice-cream was a welcome reprieve from the heat. Then the horror of realising one of the choc chips she’d just scooped and swallowed was a fly.
‘And every time I did you told me to build a bridge and get over it.’ It was all coming back to her now, including why the memory had absconded in the first place, and lo and behold it was because of her father. She remembered walking home and watching her father leaving Bree Thomas’s house. A few days later, she saw Bree’s mother Nancy leaving her father’s office and that’s when it hit her. Nancy Thomas was her father’s latest plaything.
The memory also highlighted why Bree Thomas would probably never forgive her. Not that Bree was likely to be the forgiving type, but her father had pretty much fucked over both Bree’s mother and father, just in different ways.
It wasn’t the first time one her father’s affairs had caused a rift between her and the child of the other woman and really, none of them bothered her, except for the one between Sera and herself. It went deeper with Sera because Sera blamed Anna for the affair just as much as she blamed her mother and Anna’s father. And in one way she was right.
‘I think I also told you not to worry about it too much because you were ingesting a source of protein and could do with some fattening up.’ Sera looked pointedly at her. ‘You still could.’
Anna geared up to shoot back that for someone with Italian heritage she shouldn’t be so carb-phobic but before she had the chance, Juliette jumped in. There she was, using those Cole mediation skills. She was good, even after years of not having to pull Anna and Sera apart, Juliette still could pick the point at which a fight was about to break out.
‘So we’ll go to Elle’s for dinner? I have a book launch early arvo. It should wrap up by six or seven and I can meet you both there.’
‘What book launch?’
‘One of Teddy’s uni mates. It’s a photography book, really good by the looks of it.’
‘You want us to stay and help with the launch?’ Anna asked, partly because she still wasn’t too keen on being left with Sera.
Juliette shook her head as she sipped her tea. ‘No. Tilly is putting on some light snacks and Teddy is staying to do coffees, so it’s pretty much set. We should ask Jack and Patrick to come along too. Make it a little party.’
At the mention of Jack’s name Anna stiffened. She’d successfully avoided him for the past week and a half and although she knew it wasn’t feasible to expect she could continue to do so, she would’ve liked to avoid him on her birthday. ‘I would prefer to keep it to just us.’
‘Oh come on.’ Sera looked her and drummed her fingers on the table. ‘A little male company might liven things up. It’ll be way too tame if we leave it as a girls only thing.’
‘You’re just keen on having Patrick come.’ She narrowed her eyes at Sera who gave an I-don’t-give-a-rat’s-arse shrug.
‘I am. He’s nice eye candy, as is Jackson Harper, and you were keen on having him around until your little smooch-fest went sour the other night.’
Anna closed her eyes and clenched her fists. As a child and teenager, Sera’s bluntness had bothered her at times. Nothing had changed. If anything, it pissed her off even more. There were times when they were growing up that Anna wondered if she would even be friends with Sera if it wasn’t for Juliette. They tolerated each other because of Juliette, and right now, Sera was pushing that tolerance threshold to the limit.
‘Honey, what happened with Jack?’ Juliette reached over and rubbed her arm with concern.
‘Nothing,’ she lied and drank the last of her tea. ‘We just…well, it wasn’t meant to be. I think we both had different ideas about what was going to happen that night.’
Anna had thought Jack was single and unattached. Clearly that wasn’t the case.
‘What total bullshit.’ Sera threw the statement at her and Anna felt like she’d been slapped.
‘Excuse me?’ Shock gave away to anger and she felt her blood begin to boil.
‘Bree Thomas showed up and you got scared.’
‘How did—’
‘I know about Bree? Jack told me last week.’
Anna gripped the table and closed her eyes as she took in the information. She wasn’t sure what to address first. The fact that Sera had been talking to Jackson about her or that she knew about Bree turning up. Sera had probably had a good laugh at her expense. The daughter of the town’s Lothario getting a taste of her own medicine.
‘You should talk to him. Get the whole story.’
‘I know the whole story,’ she spat out. ‘And I don’t appreciate having the details of my life talked about behind my back.’
Sera held her palms up in defence. ‘Hey, don’t blame me. The poor guy had been trying to talk to you for days.’
‘Is that why you’ve been helping in the kitchen?’ Juliette weighed in. ‘To avoid seeing Jack?’
Anna let out an exasperated sigh and nodded. She didn’t care if she wasn’t straight with Sera, but she couldn’t lie to Juliette, not when she was pressed and definitely not to her face.
‘Banana, have you forgotten this is Ellesmere? You can’t avoid anyone or anything here. Invite him to dinner and talk to him, clear the air. I know Jack, he won’t force you to do anything you don’t want, but make sure you know exactly what you are saying no to.’
She would do as Juliette suggested. Ask Jack to dinner, but only to make it clear there could be nothing between them. Juliette was right. She couldn’t avoid Jack, but she could avoid history repeating itself. For as long as she could remember there had been another woman in her parents’ marriage and as a result she had no desire to be the other woman.
* * *
After almost two weeks of unanswered phone calls and messages Jack had all but given up, despite Sera’s advice not to. So it came as a mild shock when he walked into The Bookworm and Anna was not only at the counter, but actually smiled, albeit tentatively, and said hello to him.
‘Hi yourself. I was beginning to think you were avoiding me.’ He chuckled at his own joke and Anna gave a nervous laugh.
‘Yes, well…I’ve had a lot on…No, actually, that’s a lie…’ Anna shook her head and expelled a breath. ‘I have. Been avoiding you.’
‘Okay…’ At least she was honest and it was a step. ‘Look I need to explain—’
She shook her head and held up and hand to stop him. ‘We can talk tonight. You free for dinner?’
‘Dinner?’ Jack asked, slightly dumbfounded. After not hearing from her for days, the last thing he’d expected was something that sounded suspiciously like a date. Not that he was complaining; a date with Anna, he would take that. He would offer to cook, ask her over to his place. His mind was already planning the night when Anna burst his bubble.
‘Yes. It’s my birthday and Juliette thought it would be nice if we all went to Elle’s for dinner. It will be us girls and Patrick said he was free too.’
He hid his disappointment. He should’ve known it was too good to be true. And it had been Juliette’s idea, not Anna’s.
‘Oh. Happy birthday!’ He went to lean over the counter and give her a friendly peck on the cheek and felt her body tense. He stepped back and shoved his hands in his pockets. Well, that was awkward.
‘Thanks.’ She cleared her throat. ‘So, if you are free, you are more than welcome to come, unless you have other plans?’
Was she giving him an out? He searched her eyes for any clues as to what she may be feeling or thinking but all he saw was trepidation. Shit, did he really make her feel that way?
‘I’d love to come and celebrate your birthday. I’m free. Completely.’
* * *
Anna left Juliette at The Bookworm and headed home to get ready for dinner with Jack. Well, it wasn’t dinner with Jack – it was dinner with a group of friends, including Jack. It was her birthday and even though she didn’t really celebrate it, for Juliette’s sake at least she would make an effort. As she let herself in she could hear a commotion coming from the kitchen, a lot of drawers and cupboards slamming followed by a tirade of foul language that was so typical of Sera. After their tiff this morning, Anna was less than keen to deal with her, especially if she was in a mood. Best she sneak upstairs and get herself ready for tonight. She was almost at the stairs, almost home free, when the floorboard underneath her creaked. How Sera heard it with all the noise she was making was beyond her.
‘Anna? Is that you?’
Anna sighed and closed her eyes. ‘Yeah, I’m just heading up to have a shower.’
‘Can you come into the kitchen?’
What, no please?
Anna figured she might as well get it over with so she trudged into the kitchen. ‘What on earth are you doing?’
Sera didn’t answer right away as she continued her frantic search. ‘Sera?’ Anna prodded.
‘I’m looking for the sketchbook. I’ve been looking for it for hours.’
‘Juliette did say she threw it out, maybe she did?’
For the first time since Anna came into the kitchen Sera looked at her. ‘And you really think she was telling the truth? God, Anna, you’re a lawyer, I thought you’d be smarter than that.’
Anna clenched her fists. She would not get into a fight with Sera for the second time today. Sera had told her about the sketchbook that Juliette had mentioned during her last trip to the hospital. Today Anna was meant to scope out more information about Lucy, the nurse they’d bumped into.
‘So any luck?’
‘Does it look like I’ve had any luck?’
Anna closed her eyes and counted to five. Seriously, Sera wasn’t making it easy. ‘I know I’m not your favourite person in the world, but we can’t make progress and find Noah if we’re constantly fighting. We’re on the same side remember?’
Sera stopped and softened some. ‘You’re right,’ she said somewhat begrudgingly. ‘What did you find out today?’
‘I didn’t have much time, but I did find out that Lucy Hale is on leave, she comes back at the end of next month.’
‘Shit.’
‘My sentiments exactly. I left a note with our contact numbers, but I say we keep on it and call again when she’s back.’
Sera nodded. ‘In the meantime, all we have is finding the sketchbook.’ She looked around the kitchen.
‘Where else have you looked?’
‘Where haven’t I looked? Her room, every storage cupboard in the house, this place.’ She spread her arms out. They’d been looking on and off for days, taking what little opportunity they had when they were alone to search without raising Juliette’s suspicions. But no progress. Anna wondered if they were flogging a dead horse.
‘Maybe we’re overplaying this – maybe he really was just someone who was a friend,’ Anna mused.
‘Nope, there was no mistaking it. He was an important someone.’
‘Then we keep looking for the sketchbook and while we are waiting for Lucy to call us we can search the surrounding high school websites and see if we can find Noah that way. If he was receiving treatment at Coffs, there really can’t be many schools, right?’
Sera mulled over Anna’s suggestion. ‘Good plan.’
The two former friends locked gazes and Anna felt her spirits lift. Praise from Sera shouldn’t matter so much, yet it did.
‘Shit, is that the time?’ Sera spied the wall clock behind her. ‘We need to get ready.’ She made a move past Anna, presumably to go and hog the shower, but not before throwing one last comment over her shoulder.
‘And since it’s your birthday, try and tart yourself up for once.’
Anna sighed and propped her elbows on the counter before letting her face fall into her hands. They might be working towards a common goal, but it was clear they still had very little in common.
* * *
It was a little after seven when Jack walked into Elle’s. He saw Sera at the bar and then craned his neck and scanned the pub, searching for Anna. He spotted her sitting in a booth near the window with Patrick. She was wearing an emerald green top that set off her strawberry blonde hair that was swept up in a loose bun. It might not be what he had originally thought the evening was going to be but now that he was here, he was going to seize the opportunity. He also saw it as some kind of sign that the small gift he’d scrambled to get her was the same colour as the top she was wearing.
He was about to head over to Anna and Patrick when Sera turned away from the bar, balancing three wine glasses and a bottle of white.
‘Hi!’ Sera yelled over the Friday-night bustle.
‘You need help with that?’ He made a move to take the glasses but Sera shook her head.
‘I’m right, just get yourself a glass if you’re fine with drinking white.’ She nodded towards Patrick and Anna. ‘We’re over there.’
Jack waded through the throng of patrons and made his way to the bar. Dave and a couple of other bar staff were hard at work serving those in need of an ale or two to celebrate the end of the working week. He caught Dave’s attention and got the extra wine glass and was about to head over to the others when he saw Johnno Taylor and Bree Thomas sitting close and cosy in a booth.
He felt a grin break out across his face and he wasn’t sure if he felt more sorry for Johnno or relieved for himself. He definitely was glad that Bree had finally gotten the hint he wasn’t interested. Not that he’d been subtle the night of the grand final. He’d gotten the impression that Bree wasn’t giving up, but maybe he was wrong? God he hoped so, but it also seemed from the look on Johnno’s face that his pity was unwarranted. He wasn’t sure how many schooners his mate had downed but he seemed more than fine with the attention he was receiving from Bree.
He must’ve still had the grin on his face when he reached the others because Patrick drew his brows together and looked at him with a question. ‘What you grinning at?’
‘Nothing,’ Jack shrugged, not wanting to draw attention to the actual source of his amusement. ‘It’s Friday. What is there not to smile about?’
‘Speaking of beautiful women, where’s Juliette?’ Patrick asked.
‘She had something on at The Bookworm. She’ll be here soon,’ Sera explained. ‘In the meantime I’m starving, how about we get some snacks while we wait.’
In true Sera style, this was said as a statement and she went around the table taking orders.
‘Right.’ She slid out from the booth and zeroed in on Patrick. ‘How about you come with me, Mr Mayor, and help me, just in case I forget anything.’
Patrick looked at her doubtfully. ‘Are you saying you can learn lines but not a few snack orders?’
Sera placed her hands on her hips and glared at Patrick. Jack squirmed in his seat. He knew what Sera was trying to do and by the look on Anna’s face, she did too. Poor Patrick was out of the loop.
‘Just come,’ she demanded and Patrick relented, but not before rolling his eyes. They wouldn’t be gone long so Jack knew he had to work fast. It was Anna who spoke first.
‘Jack, I’m sorry for not returning your calls. It’s just…well, you know my family’s sordid history and it was all a little bit surreal. It was like déjà vu, especially since it was at my old house.’
He could see how it would’ve stirred up some old memories, but he needed to make sure Anna knew there was nothing going on with Bree. ‘Anna, you need to know there was only one date. Just one. Months ago and it was a pretty ordinary one.’ Jack watched Anna’s reaction. ‘And I would really like to take you out. On a date.’
‘Oh, Jack. I’m not so sure about that, I mean—’
‘Don’t say no, not just yet,’ he stopped her mid rejection.
‘Jack. There’s something you need to know. Why I am really here.’
‘I know why you’re here. You’re here for Juliette.’
Anna looked at him in confusion. ‘You…know about her…condition?’
‘I do and I think that having both of you here, Sera and you, it’s what she needs.’
‘Yes. It is.’ Anna toyed with her wine glass, her voice tinged with sadness.
‘And I think what you need is to come surfing with me tomorrow.
‘Jack, I—’ Anna was poised to roll out another attempt at rejecting him. Instead she stopped and stared at him wordlessly for a moment. ‘Surfing?’
Okay. Now he had her attention. ‘Come on, you grew up in Ellesmere, surely you would’ve learned how to surf?’
She surprised him by shaking her head.
‘Really?’
Anna shrugged and took a sip of her wine. ‘It really wasn’t something that I was interested in.’
‘But you have one of the best surfing beaches on the mid North Coast.’
Anna looked at him blankly. He might as well have said unicorns were real. She couldn’t care less. But he wasn’t going to let this opportunity slip through his fingers.
‘Six a.m. tomorrow, south end of the beach. I’ll meet you there.’
‘I have to help out at the café.’
‘Café doesn’t open till eight. I’ll have you back there on time.’
‘But…I don’t have a wetsuit.’
Jack shrugged. ‘No problem. You can borrow one of mine.’
He could see Anna searching for the next excuse, but she was fast running out of them. Patrick and Sera had returned to the table.
‘Hey, you’ll never guess who Bree’s got her talons into now,’ Sera announced as she and Patrick slid back into the booth.
‘I have no idea,’ Jack said innocently, his gaze staying on Anna, watching her eyes widen with interest. ‘Who?’
‘Johnno Taylor. They’re getting all cosy too.’
‘Poor bastard.’ Patrick shook his head in pity and Jack continued to watch Anna’s face.
‘Six a.m., south end of the beach,’ he repeated. ‘I’ll be the one holding the surfboard.’
Jack held his breath and waited, then watched as Anna nodded tentatively. He let out his breath and took a sip of his wine. Baby steps. He knew that he needed to take baby steps with her, even if it took months, because something told him that Anna Kendall was worth it.
* * *
It took Anna a few moments to remember why her alarm was blaring at her at quarter to six in the morning.
Surfing. With Jack. It wasn’t a date. Really? Then why are you getting up at this ungodly hour and going surfing?
It was a good question. She was supposed to let him know she couldn’t see him…not in anything but a friendly capacity. She wasn’t supposed to allow herself to be talked into waking up at the crack of dawn and dragging herself out of a warm bed. It might have been October, but the mornings were still fairly chilly and this morning was no exception.
Anna pushed back the covers and shivered as she found her swimmers and asked herself: why she was doing this?
Because Jack had asked. And she had run out of excuses. Plus it was one morning, a couple of hours max. There was that, and there was the visual of Jack in a wetsuit, or rather peeling off a wetsuit, that had gotten her blood pumping from the moment he’d mentioned surfing. The latter was reason enough and, after all, she was only human. She would meet him to indulge his silly idea about teaching her to surf, then head to the café.
Anna pulled her hair back into a loose bun and tiptoed down the stairs. There was no sign of either Juliette or Sera. It had been a late one by the time Juliette had joined them last night and at this time of the morning most sane Ellesmere townsfolk were still asleep. At least that’s how it felt as Anna walked through the streets and headed to the southern end of the beach.
It was actually called Kendall Beach, after her family, but she was certain that no one referred to it as that anymore. She couldn’t blame them but it did surprise her how much animosity was still directed towards her, and from people like Joyce Mather and Maurice Moody, some of the few people who hadn’t been affected by her father’s deceit. What were you expecting, Anna? For a couple of months to pass and everyone would fall in love with you?
Perhaps not, but being back she was starting to remember how it felt to belong in a small town, or more accurately, to want to belong. When she left Ellesmere all those years ago, Anna never thought she would be back, and if it hadn’t been for Juliette she probably would never have come within a hundred kilometres of the town limits.
Anna walked down onto the beach and saw him. A lone figure waxing his surfboard, his wetsuit peeled down to reveal that torso. Anna’s heart skipped a beat as he spotted her and sent her a smile that made her go weak at the knees. He was definitely swoon-worthy. She knew it was a cliché, but walking across the sand towards him as he stood and speared his surfboard into the sand, she might as well have been walking onto a set for a photoshoot for a wetsuit or surfboard. It was freezing. The wind was all but gale force and she could not see a single goosebump on his body.
How could this guy be a lawyer? None of the guys at her firm looked anything like Jack. If they did she might have kissed them.
‘You made it.’
Anna tilted her head. ‘You sound surprised. Were you expecting me to be a no-show?’
‘Nah.’ Jack puffed his chest, which only made his status as eye candy soar. ‘I had no doubts. You ready to surf?’
‘Sure. I guess.’
He chuckled at her obvious lack of enthusiasm. ‘Give me an hour and I promise you’ll be seeing surfing in a new light. Trust me.’
‘Yeah, okay,’ Anna said, not at all convinced one hour could change how she felt about surfing.
They started off out of the water, going thought safety basics, and this suited Anna just fine. Jack was a good teacher, taking her through some of his experience as a beginner and what to expect in the event she should fall, which Anna predicted would be often.
‘Cover your head with your hands, with your wrists over your ears and elbows together,’ Jack demonstrated and Anna tried to concentrate, she really did, but with his arms raised up, it gave her a very nice view of his six-pack and it had her salivating.
Then Jack asked her to lie down flat and made a mark with his wax where her chin was to touch the board.
‘What’s that for?’ she asked, puzzled.
‘It is a reference point that enables you to put your chin on the same spot every time so the board will react to your weight the same way every time. Too much weight in the back and the board will cork, it’s a common rookie error. You can’t catch a wave if you are corking your board.’
‘Yeah, that makes sense.’ She looked up and realised he was close, a whisker’s distance away from a kiss. Her heart thudded against the board beneath her. He was staring intently at her so she licked her lips in anticipation of the kiss that was about to happen.
Except it didn’t.
‘Good.’ Jack stood up from where he was crouching and started to gather his things.
‘Is that it?’ she asked, failing to mask the disappointment in her voice.
‘Ahhh!’ Jack looked smugly down at her. ‘Did someone actually have a good time?’
Yes, she did. Somehow in over an hour Anna had a newfound appreciation for surfing and an even greater appreciation for her instructor; both came as a shock to her. Especially the latter. She liked Jack, she already knew that much. But she thought she could contain it, that she could get over it, after the incident with Bree. Although thinking about it now, that had really been a knee-jerk reaction. She had been scared so she had backed away.
But now she didn’t want to back away. She wanted more, of both surfing and Jack.
She craned her head to look at him. ‘Yeah, I did.’
‘I could teach you more. Would you like that?’ As he stretched out his hand and pulled her up, the skin-to-skin contact was electrifying. Currents pulsed though her blood.
‘I would,’ Anna swallowed, the heat from his touch almost too much to bear.
‘We could do it in steps. Baby steps so it’s not too overwhelming for you.’
The way he said it gave Anna the distinct impression he wasn’t just talking about surfing. Anal Anna who did things measuredly and meticulously, who relished control, wasn’t seriously considering this, was she? Except, she was. Baby steps. Small measured steps so she wouldn’t feel like she was taking a massive plunge. She could do that, couldn’t she?
Ann felt her lips curve upwards. ‘Yes. Let’s do it.’